Top 8 Profiles of the 2018 WCQ: European Championship

It all came down to this! Well, not quite, but the field has been cut down to the Top 8 Duelists of the weekend. Take a look at their Profiles!
After 11 grueling Rounds of Swiss across two days and 6 further Knockout Rounds, there are only eight Duelists remaining. All of them fought hard to get where they are right now and all of them want to go to Worlds! Two more wins separate them for their big goal. Let’s find out who they are and what they are playing today.

The Top 8 Players of 2018 WCQ: European Championship 2018:

Here are their single Profiles in more detail:

Name: Luke ParksAge: 25Country: UKWhat Deck are you playing today? Gouki, it is the best Deck and it has the best Trickstar and Sky Striker Match-Up. Nothing else beats the Deck.What do you think about your chances of winning today? I feel quite confident. I tested the Deck quite some time and know all the combos. Hopefully I have some luck on my side and go to Worlds.Any awesome tech cards you want to let the world know about? I’m running Speedroid Terrortop and Speedroid Taketomborg, they were pretty good when I drew them. The rest of the Deck is almost standard. I wanted to build the Deck as consistent as possible without diluting it with too many tech cards.Final words? Shoutouts to Jawad, Omar, Rowley Fluff and Kristoffer and everyone who wished me good luck.

Name: Robin BachofnerAge: 24Country: SwitzerlandWhat Deck are you playing today? Gouki, I started testing the Deck when the Knightmare cards were released. I already wanted to run it for Swiss Nationals, but couldn’t get accustomed to it. After Nats I playtested a lot with a friend of mine and we ended up with a decent list.What do you think about your chances of winning today? After Swiss Nationals I predicted to play 3 more events: Nationals, the European Championship and Worlds. I tried to make it to Worlds via Duel Links but failed. Now I’m sitting here in the Top 8 spot having a chance to go to Worlds.Any awesome tech cards you want to let the world know about? I’m running two Kaijus in my Main Deck. Trickstar is the best Match-Up, Gouki is die roll depended. Kaiju is always good out to anything the current top Decks can put on the field. You can take apart the “U”. They are also great a against the Dolphin, that almost everybody is running right now.Final words? Shoutouts to Team Complexity Card Gaming and all my from my home country. A very special shoutout to Tom whom I build the Deck with.

Name: Marcello BarberiAge: 24Country: ItalyWhat Deck are you playing today? Gouki: it is the best Deck since it can easily extralink and it has the best match up against Trickstar.What do you think about your chances of winning today? Pretty good! I’ll try my best to defend my title. After losing Round 1 I felt pretty bad, but recovered during the course of Day 1. I finished 6:2 after Day 1 and had to win all my matches on Day 2 to keep my chances alive.Any awesome tech cards you want to let the world know about? I’m maindecking Ghost Reaper & Winter Cherries for the mirror match, but up till now I never met one. We will see how good they really are in the next round. Until now I always sided them out.Final words? Thanks to my Team Jobber and in particular Alberto, Stefano and the two Federicos.

Name: Stathis VastardisAge: 20Country: GreeceWhat Deck are you playing today? Pure Sky Striker – I was the only playing it at our Nationals. I already knew the Deck inside out and didn’t want to change it on short notice.What do you think about your chances of winning today? I’m pretty excited! I hope to win more games and go to Worlds eventually.Any awesome tech cards you want to let the world know about? I’m running Forbidden Graveyard in my Main Deck. Going first the card is basically an autowin against Gouki.Final words? Thanks to the guys in my Skype chat. We are 15 greek guys and half of us made it to Top 64.

Name: Alessandro GaranziniAge: 18Country: ItalyWhat Deck are you playing today? Sky Striker Trickstar with Mekk-Knight, I feel it is more powerful and most versatile Deck than all the other current top Decks. You can either play control or dish out OTKs.What do you think about your chances of winning today? I’m super happy and nervous as well. I want to go to Worlds and represent Europe and Italy in Japan!Any awesome tech cards you want to let the world know about? Trickstar Lilybell! It won me the Feature Match in Top 64. My opponent had only 750 Lifepoints left and the direct attack won me the match.Final words? Shoutouts to all the people from Best Tornei Milano YGO.

Name: Nicolas MayerAge: 19Country: GermanyWhat Deck are you playing today? Trickstar Sky Striker, I feel like it is the most consistent Deck and the Deck is able to push for a lot of damage in one turn. The new Time-Out rulings favors this Deck as well.What do you think about your chances of winning today? I’m quite nervous, I finished Day 1 with a 5:2:1 record. I was forced to win all my matches and get lucky with my tie breakers.Any awesome tech cards you want to let the world know about? Heavy Storm Duster and Ghost Ogre & Snow Rabbit have put in a lot of work for me. Heavy Storm Duster is a plus 1 and most of the times I hit very important cards like Scapegoat and Trickstar Light Stage. People tend to set these cards to play around Trickstar Reincarnation.Final words? Shoutouts to my girlfriend and all of my friends whom I playtested with.

Name: Francesco SimoncelliAge: 23Country: ItalyWhat Deck are you playing today? I came up with a weird brew of Trickstar Sky Striker with tech cards and the Knightmare and the Skyblaster engine. My Main Deck consists of 45 cards. I don’t want to open with too many Normal Summons and decided to up the number of Deck cards.What do you think about your chances of winning today? I’m very happy! My Deck is a new build. Nobody is playing a similar build. The decision to run something different realy paid off and I’m very proud of it.Any awesome tech cards you want to let the world know about? I run Torrential Tribute in threefold: when I play my combo I can close it with Knightmare Cerberus making my monsters so that they cannot be destroyed by card effects. It won me a lot of games.Final words? Shoutouts to all my friends that I playtested with.

Name: Jake QuinseeAge: 25Country: UKWhat Deck are you playing today? Gouki is the most powerful Deck. Ituses the link engine most effectively and efficient. It can build big fields and do a lot of damage.What do you think about your chances of winning today? I come from the Feature Match and played against Dinosaurs. The Deck caught me off guard, because I didn’t playtest against it. I lost the first game, but managed to fight. I will take it one game at a time and hopefully I will advance through to the finals.Any awesome tech cards you want to let the world know about? I don’t want to reveal them right know.Final words? Shoutouts to Luke Parks! He is the Quarter Finals as well, to Jawad and so many other UK guys. Shoutouts to my brother, I’m still trying to convivence him to make a comeback.